Cardboard boats teach engineering

Photos by Juan Carlo / Star staff
Joe Torres, 17, of Puerto Rico tries to keep his cardboard craft afloat during a race Wednesday at Naval Base Ventura County Port Hueneme. At top, Valerie Tucciarone, 17, of Las Vegas works on a flag for her team's boat.

Parker Phillips, 16, of Oklahoma builds a flagpole for his team's boat Wednesday. The boat races are the highlight of the engineering and construction camp.

Go, go, go!" shout some 40 teenagers around a pool.

"Come, go faster! They're catchin' up!"

Four teens glide across the water, racing to get to the other end and back. But they're not swimming, they're rowing. And they aren't in typical crafts — they're rowing in cardboard boats they made as part of an engineering and construction camp this week at Naval Base Ventura County.

Sponsored by the Society of Military Engineers and hosted by the 31st Seabee Readiness Group, the camp selected about 40 applicants from across the country, giving them the chance to get hands-on experience in construction and engineering.

It's the seventh time the camp has been held at the base. The weeklong camp's highlight is the cardboard boat racing, where four teams have three hours to make a buoyant boat out of cardboard, plastic wrap and duct tape.

The four teams are judged on design, construction and a series of races across the pool.

The exercise is designed to get the teens thinking, said Tony Dapp, the officer in charge of the camp.

"The whole concept of the cardboard box seems impossible," Dapp said. "We wanted to push the students with a chance to create with a lot of creativity."

The boats were built in all different shapes, sizes and lengths, some resembling kayaks and others pointed boxes.

"The Man Clan Plus 3" team came in first with its boat, The PanDragon. Jeneé Christensen of Beavercreek, Ohio, raced The PanDragon first, steadily rowing to the sound of her teammates chanting her name. "My muscles were quivering, I was so nervous," said the 14-year-old.

In the second race, the boat's designer, Valerie Tucciarone of Las Vegas, paddled it across but had trouble keeping up and steering. "It was scary," said the 17-year-old. "I looked over and they were halfway down the pool."

But she won, mostly because of the boat's design based on triangles, simple angles and structural beams inside, she said.

One team out-chanted the others and waved a cardboard American flag with "Squad Three" scribbled over the stars as its boat, named the USS Harry Kim after one of the camp's eight volunteer mentors, struggled to stay afloat.

Before the race, 14-year-old Adam Giniger of Panama City Beach, Fla., said the boat smothered in plastic wrap weighed about 35 pounds. "We'll salute it if it sinks," he said.

It flipped over, filled with water and collapsed, but it didn't sink. No salute necessary.

The San Francisco-based URS Corp., an engineering firm, sponsored the boat project, donating about $2,000 worth of materials.

The 40 teens also built small bridges out of Popsicle sticks and wood glue earlier in the week, which they will test and watch collapse on Friday.

The nation needs engineers, and these kids are the future, said Lance C. Brendel, vice president of federal programs for URS' Pacific region. "We want them to think, show innovative design," Brendel said.